Jamoncillo de Nuez Potosino (Mercado Hidalgo)

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Wide copper cazo or heavy 5-quart stainless pot
• •Long wooden spoon with a flat edge
• •Candy thermometer
• •Small bowl of cold water for testing the punto
• •8-inch square pan or shallow wooden candy frame
• •Damp pastry brush
• •Sharp oiled knife

Instructions

1. 1

   Prepare the frame

   Line an 8-inch square pan or a shallow wooden candy frame with parchment. Brush the parchment and a sharp knife lightly with neutral oil. Set a small bowl of cold water near the stove for testing the punto. Jamoncillo moves quickly at the end. The cook who waits to prepare the pan loses the candy.

2. 2

   Toast the nuez

   Heat a dry comal or heavy skillet over medium-low. Toast the nuez pecanera for 4 to 5 minutes, stirring often, until it smells warm and nutty and the cut sides turn one shade darker. Chop 175 grams roughly and keep the best halves for the top. Do not burn them. A bitter pecan will poison the whole cazo.

   Buy pecans where turnover is fast. At Mercado Hidalgo, ask to smell them. Fresh nuez smells sweet and oily. Old nuez smells like rancid oil, and no amount of goat milk will hide that.
3. 3

   Start the milk

   Pour the leche de cabra into a clean copper cazo or a heavy wide pot. Add the cane sugar, grated piloncillo claro, bicarbonato de sodio, canela, and salt. Set over medium-low heat and stir with a wooden spoon until the sugars dissolve completely. The bicarbonato may make the milk foam. Let it settle and keep stirring from the bottom so the milk does not catch.

4. 4

   Cook to punto

   Raise the heat to medium and keep the mixture at a lively simmer, stirring often at first and constantly once it thickens. It will move from white milk to café con leche, then to a heavy caramel paste that opens a clean path when the spoon drags across the bottom. Start testing after 45 minutes. Drop a little candy into cold water. It should gather into a soft ball that holds for a second, then flattens between your fingers. Use the thermometer as a guardrail: cook to about 22 to 24°F above your local boiling point of water, usually 235 to 238°F at sea level and about 223 to 226°F in the capital of San Luis Potosí. The cold-water test decides. Así se hace y punto.

   Do not scrape dried sugar crystals from the sides back into the pot. Wipe the sides with a damp pastry brush instead. Scraped crystals make sandy jamoncillo.
5. 5

   Cool before beating

   Take the cazo off the heat and remove the canela. Let the candy sit undisturbed for 10 to 12 minutes, until the fierce bubbling stops and the surface is still glossy but no longer loose. Stir in the vanilla. This short rest matters. Beat too hot and the crystals grow coarse. Wait too long and it sets in the pot. La cocina no es decoración, es trabajo.

6. 6

   Beat in nuez

   Beat the candy hard with the wooden spoon for 4 to 7 minutes. The color will lighten slightly, the shine will dull, and the spoon will feel heavier with every turn. When it turns matte at the edges, fold in the chopped nuez pecanera quickly and thoroughly. This beating is what makes jamoncillo instead of cajeta left too long on the fire. No me vengas con atajos.

7. 7

   Press and set

   Scrape the thick candy immediately into the prepared pan. Press it into an even slab about 3/4 inch thick with an oiled spatula or the back of the wooden spoon. Press the reserved pecan halves into the top while the surface is still soft. Let it stand 15 minutes, then score into bars. Let it set fully for about 2 hours before cutting cleanly.

8. 8

   Wrap and serve

   Cut the jamoncillo along the scored lines and wrap the bars in wax paper or butcher paper, mercado style. Serve at room temperature on a plain clay platón, not cold from the refrigerator. The texture should be firm, fine-grained, and tender under the teeth, with the goat milk and pecan doing the work. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.

Chef Tips

• •Use leche de cabra entera. Whole cow milk will set, but the flavor becomes flatter and sweeter. That is a compromise, not the Mercado Hidalgo version.
• •The cazo de cobre is traditional because copper conducts heat evenly and helps the milk reduce without scorching. If the copper has green spots or verdigris, do not cook in it. Scrub it properly or use a heavy stainless pot.
• •Do not replace piloncillo claro with brown sugar. Piloncillo tastes of Mexican cane. Brown sugar tastes of molasses from a supermarket shelf. They are not the same thing.
• •San Luis Potosí sits high, so candy temperatures read lower than sea-level recipes. Learn the cold-water test. A señora at the market does not need a thermometer because her fingers know the punto.
• •If the jamoncillo crumbles, you cooked it too far or beat it too long. If it stays sticky after setting, you stopped before the soft-ball point. The recipe is not hard, but it is exact.
• •Make it the day before a fiesta. Jamoncillo cuts cleaner after it rests overnight, and the pecan flavor settles into the milk fudge.

Advance Preparation

• •Jamoncillo can be made 3 days ahead and kept tightly wrapped at room temperature in a cool, dry place.
• •For longer storage, refrigerate wrapped bars in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks, then bring them fully to room temperature before serving.
• •Do not freeze jamoncillo. The sugar crystals weep when thawed and the texture turns wet at the surface.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 45g)